Daily industrial news and top headlines for plant and maintenance managers

SYDNEY (AP) — Tests have uncovered oil leaks in three Rolls-Royce engines on Qantas' grounded Airbus A380s, the airline's CEO said Monday, as engineers tried to zero in on the cause of an engine failure on board one of the carrier's superjumbo jets last week.
Australia's national carrier grounded its six double-decker A380s, the world's newest and largest airliner, after an engine burst minutes into a flight from Singapore to Sydney last week, scattering debris over Indonesia's Batam island.

Many food and beverage manufacturers produce wastewater that is high in organic content, and must therefore be treated before it is discharged into streams or into the municipal sewer system. Strict regulations protect the environment and the public water treatment systems from being overloaded and degrading the water quality.

The portable and cordless HEMIPRO High Power Worklights from Cliplight Manufacturing (Toronto, ON, Canada) and Go Distribution are designed to provide 50,000 hours of halo-free LED illumination. The high-power LEDs are housed in a light-but-rugged casing designed to handle workplace rigors.

The new Safety Sentry Warning Signal Alarm from Erich Industries (Verona, WI) can alert workers of a nearby vehicle backing into the dock position. The Safety Sentry uses a 105 dB siren and strobe light in combination with motion sensing technology. According to the company, at least one dock-related fatality occurs each year nationwide, and the Safety Sentry could help prevent a similar incident.

Pregis Corp. (Deerfield, IL) has introduced a new hybrid cushioning system that can handle multiple roll widths (up to 32”) via a dispenser head than is 60 percent smaller than previous models. The Air Speed HV Versa can provide cushioning in three different widths: 24” wide cushions from 32” rolls, as well as 18” and 12” wide size.

Belden (St. Louis, MO) has enhanced their Belden Infinity C-TC+ and FCC cables with the addition of Belden high-performance Belflex jackets, which offer resistance to sunlight, oil, and abrasion. They also provide flexing capabilities and the ability to withstand temperature ranges of -40°C to 90°C (cold impact) and -50°C to 90°C (cold bend).

A number of news sources — including the Associated Press — have recently reported that Google has been quietly working on research and development of hardware and software solutions toward a lofty goal: autonomous cars. According to a post on Google’s corporate blog, the self-driving vehicles have rolled over 140,000 miles on California roads with drivers sitting behind the wheel, ready to intervene in case of a malfunction.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The economy generated a net gain in jobs for the first time in five months in October, as businesses stepped up their painfully slow pace of hiring.
But the unemployment rate, measured by a separate survey of households, remained stuck at 9.6 percent for the third straight month.

DETROIT (AP) — Trucks outsold cars by the highest margin in nearly five years in October, a sign the economy may be starting to improve.
These trucks aren't the tractor-trailers that haul freight. They're pickups, sport utility vehicles, minivans and smaller SUVs. The category — known as light-duty trucks — made up 54 percent of all new U.

CUMMING, Ga. (AP) — Officials in Forsyth County say a worker at the county's water plant died after being trapped under a piece of machinery.
Capt. Jason Shivers of the Forsyth County fire department says the man, whose name has not been released, worked for a subcontractor at the plant.

TOKYO (AP) — Panasonic Corp. is investing $30 million in Tesla Motors Inc., the U.S. maker of electric sports cars, eyeing expansion in the global market for green vehicles, both sides said Thursday.
Panasonic, Japan's biggest electronics maker, will acquire about a 2 percent stake in Tesla, purchasing Tesla common stock at $21.

TOKYO (AP) — Toyota's second quarter profit more than quadrupled despite lingering worries about the safety of its cars after massive recalls that are still dogging its sales in the U.S.
Toyota reported July-September profit of 98.7 billion yen ($1.2 billion) on Friday, up dramatically from 21.

DETROIT (AP) — General Motors has the potential to make huge pretax profits once global auto sales fully recover, the company's chief financial officer said Thursday in a video presentation that was posted online.
The video with CFO Chris Liddell's comments is the foundation for GM's "road show" — presentations that start Friday and aim to court investors for an initial public stock offering.

A line of Type 29 ceramic flap discs are now available from Rex-Cut Products, Inc. (Fall River, MA). The Rex-Cut Sigma Ceramic Flap Discs provide aggressive stock removal with smooth operator control on steel and stainless steel, according to the company, and feature a slight angle that provides a greater contact area.

Firmware version 3.50 is now available for Danfoss’ (Milwaukee, WI) VLT HVAC Drives, and provides on-board BACnet communication to maximize installation, expansion, and modification flexibility. A “Smart-Start” functionality allows for faster commissioning of the drive and motor.

The DayLube high-performance grease from Dayton Progress Corporation (Dayton, OH) uses nanoceramic particles, which provide continuous lubrication to steel surfaces with a lower coefficient of friction at all temperatures than traditional PTFE greases. According to the company, the grease does not soften or run out — after 100,000 production strokes, it showed no evidence of breaking down.

The new Sortasaurus ergonomic table from Meese Orbitron Dunne Co. (Ashtabula, OH) is rotationally-molded from smooth and 100 percent waterproof polyethylene plastic to eliminate the splinters, bacterial concerns, and other safety issues associated with wooden tables. The Sortasaurus table uses a one-piece design with wings on three sides to help corral diverse products, parts, and packages as they are put on the table.

Business leaders in the manufacturing space are pessimistic, with only a third (33 percent) expecting the U.S. economy to improve in the next six months, according to Grant Thornton’s quarterly survey of U.S. business leaders. The hiring outlook for manufacturing companies is also gloomy — only 37 percent of manufacturing business leaders report that their companies will increase hiring in the next six months.

The business of bringing new therapeutic products to market is full of challenges. From high costs and long development trajectories to unanticipated side effects and questions of reimbursement, succeeding in the pharmaceutical industry requires intellectual, scientific, regulatory, and financial acumen.

Japanese researchers have developed a human-like robot to supplement the country's shrinking workforce, as nearly 25 percent of the country's population is over the age of 65. The machine has 34 moving joints, stands almost 5-feet tall, and weighs 85 pounds. According to CBS News , the robots are expected to be used in manufacturing applications, and their mobility will allow them to move around the plant at will.